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December 1st changes to FRBPs, Official Forms, and Miscellaneous Fees

Monday, November 18, 2013

On December 1st, there will be changes to Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure 1007(b)(7), 4004(c)(1), 5009(b), 9006(d), 9013 and 9014. With the exception of a few stylistic changes, these changes cover two main areas - changes to allow the financial education course providers to file the certificate of debtor's completion of the financial management course in CMECF and changes regarding the timing of written responses to a motion.

There are changes to Rules 37 and 45 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure as well. These may affect bankruptcy practice insofar as any Bankruptcy Rule that references those Civil Rules.

There are also some miscellaneous fee changes going into affect on that date, as well:

Additional $176 fee for a motion to sell property of the estate free and clear of liens under 11 U.S.C. § 363(f).

Increase in record retrieval fees: the fee for retrieval of a record from the Federal Records Center, National Archives, or other storage location will increase from $53 to $64 for the first box and $39 for each additional box of the same record.

The $53 fee for checks returned for lack of funds is now expanded to apply to "any payment returned or denied for insufficient funds.

Finally, there will be changes to Official Forms 3A (Application for Individuals to Pay the Filing Fee in Installments), 3B (Application to Have the Chapter 7 Filing Fee Waived), 6I (Schedule I: Your Income), 6J (Schedule J: Your Expenses), 6 Summary (Summary of Schedules), 23 (Debtor’s Certification of Completion of Instructional Course Concerning Financial Management) and 27 (Reaffirmation Agreement Cover Sheet). Some of these changes are the result of the above rule changes and some are due to the Forms Modernization Project.

You may go to the uscourts.gov site for more information about the changes. Click here for a general description of the Rules changes. Click here to view a PDF of the amendments to the Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure. Click here to read a description of Forms changes and to view each amended form individually, if you wish. Click here to view a PDF of the amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.